Spruce Goose Design & Build

Spanning almost 25 feet, the Spruce Goose wing was constructed mainly from wood. Spruce and Finnish Birch, were the primary components and balsa was used for the leading edge. The main inner spar was machined out of 3/8 thick aluminum plate with lightning holes and designed to act as an I-Beam style spar. Hexcell caps were added to the spar for superior strength and flexibility.

The entire tail section (horizontal and vertical stabilizers) was designed and built in-house as well as the control surfaces, (elevator and rudder) which were constructed out of balsa wood with foam core to save weight.

The fuselage for this model was also built entirely by Aero Telemetry personnel. The two fuselage halves were carefully layed-up with fiberglass and carbon fiber. Aerocell reinforcement between the fuselage bulkheads was used to provide a lightweight but strong mount for the one-piece monster wing.

The original Spruce Goose, designed by Howard Hughes and his talented engineering staff, incorporated several ingenious designs to allow the world's largest airplane to fly. Like Howard Hughes and his team, Joe Bok and his engineering staff incorporated several ingenious designs into their version of the Spruce Goose.

The aerodynamic profile of the wing, engine thrust-lines, CG location, main airfoil angle of attack, incidence angles (between wing and horizontal stabilizer), counter-rotating propellers, and vertical stabilizer offset angles were just a few of the critical design criteria addressed and implemented correctly by the Aero Telemetry engineering design team. All these specific details contributed directly to the success and margin of safety exemplified in all the flights of the Aero Telemetry Spruce Goose in the Long Beach Harbor on November 23rd and 24th of 2003.